How This Has Made Consumers More Powerful

Social media has empowered consumers (Gensler et al., 2013) and as a result the balance of power has shifted from businesses to consumers (Christodoulides, 2009; Fournier & Avery, 2011). Consumers mastered these “interactive technologies” (Christodoulides, 2009) to use brands for their own motivations to:

The Society Will Continue to Evolve

Now that we live in a fast-paced age of interactivity, where consumers are very powerful, brands are threatened by ‘Digital Darwinism’, as “society and technology is evolving faster than brands can adapt” (Tarnovskaya, 2016b). Brands of the future, hence, needs to have the following ingrained in their DNA. They must:

win key consumer moments in a mobile-first society

be connected and collaborate with other brands

be more personal than ever

Mobile-First & Micro-moments

We live in a mobile-first society. We wake up, pick-up our smartphones, carry them around everywhere we go, without letting them out of our sight, until we go back to sleep. We expect information to be at our fingertips (Google, 2016a). People are conditioned to search on their smartphones to meet their immediate needs.

Mobile has essentially altered how people consume media (Ramaswamy, 2015) and hence fragmented consumer journeys into bursts of “real-time, intent-driven, micro-moments” (Google, n.d.) “of curiosity, research, and decision” (Lawson, 2016a). Coined by Google, micro-moments are intent-rich moments when a person reflexively, acting on an impulse turns to the nearest device to act on a need – to learn something new, make a decision or get things done (Google, n.d., 2016a, 2016b). Click here to watch the micro-moments video

Micro-moments provide brands with innumerable opportunities to connect with consumers (Lawson, 2016a) “on their most personal devices” (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2010, p.321). This is crucial for brands because in these moments decisions are taken and preferences are shaped (Google, n.d.; Ramaswamy, 2015). Google identified four “critical touchpoints within today’s consumer journey” (Adams, Burkholder & Hamilton, 2015) that next-generation brands needs to focus on (shown below).

Source: (Google, 2016b)

Brands of the future must win these four key micro-moments with the four following strategies (Adams, Burkholder & Hamilton, 2015; Gevelber, 2016; Google, n.d.; Ramaswamy, 2015)

Be Pre-emptive

Brands should evaluate all stages of the consumer journey to pinpoint a set of must-win moments. The figure below exhibits five-ways of doing this. Brands need to understand what consumers want: when they wish to find inspiration, learn about products or buy something.

Source: (Lawson, 2016b)

Be There

Studies have shown that most consumers are loyal to their needs-in-the-moment and not necessarily to brands. Companies should identify and prioritise brand-related and category-related moments and ensure their presence, when these moments transpire. This will improve brand awareness among potential consumers.

Source: (Adams, Burkholder & Hamilton, 2015)

Be Useful

Brands need be useful to consumers’ needs-in-the-moment to be able to shape their perceptions. To satisfy people brands need to connect them to the relevant information they are seeking. They must delve-deep into the moment and envisage how to “deliver the right experience” tailored for that moment using “contextual signals” such as “location or time of day”. See the Starbucks example below.

Source: (Adams, Burkholder & Hamilton, 2015)

Be Lightning-Fast

Companies needs to deliver a fast and seamless mobile experience for users who wants to “know, go, do, or buy” quickly, in the moment. Consumers expect brands to deliver right things, right away.

Source: (Adams, Burkholder & Hamilton, 2015)

Connected & Collaborated

People are now more connected than ever and devices are inextricably woven into our daily life. Brands can now engage across a symphony of devices. Next-generation brands must realise that retention will only come through reiterated interaction.

Connected Life Platforms

The connectivity, power and intelligence of computing is dripping “from our devices into our objects” (Wilson, 2011). ‘Connected life platforms’ or the Internet of Things (IoT) are a plethora of smart, connected, “physical objects, seamlessly integrated into the information network”, forming an ecosystem, that constantly interacts with consumers and “generates actionable insights” (Dubash, 2016; Eagle, 2015; Haller, Karnouskos & Schroth, 2009).

Brands of the future should use an array of surrounding smart and connected devices to interact with consumers in real-time and create touchpoints. Companies should create a lifestyle around the consumer and constantly engage with them to make their life easier. Connected platforms would provide businesses with a myriad of data that can be used to glean insights to provide an enhanced consumer experience (Google, 2015; Martin, 2016), leading to a long-term relationship between brands and consumers. Applications of the IoT is ubiquitous. Nevertheless, next-generation brands should specifically focus on the following

Source: (Dubash, 2016)

Human

People are increasingly using devices to attached to or inside their body (Manyika et al., 2015). People are donning smart-wearables such as smart-watches and fitness-bands. Wearables are even more intimate than smartphones and will shape the future IoT (Ericsson ConsumerLab, 2016). ‘Internables’ are next-generation health-monitoring and disease management technology, embedded with “micro-cameras” that are navigating in human bodies (Chui, Löffler & Roberts, 2010).